GREAT! Movies TV Guide: Listings, Schedule & What’s On GREAT! Movies Tonight

GREAT! Movies is a free-to-air film channel, though a fair bit harder to stumble across since a 2025 reshuffle of the Freeview line-up (more on that below). Tonight, Friday 21 August 2026, Staged Killer opens the evening at 5:52pm, a 2019 thriller with Chrishell Stause as a morning-show host whose career and marriage both start to buckle once an old colleague talks his way back into her life. Live Once, Die Twice follows at 7:31pm, a 2006 thriller with Kellie Martin as a woman whose husband turns out to have faked his own death rather badly. The Double takes the 9:04pm slot, a 2011 spy thriller pairing Richard Gere’s retired CIA man with Topher Grace’s rookie FBI agent to track down whoever assassinated a US Senator, and Jack Hunter and the Star of Heaven closes the night at 10:42pm — the third and last outing for Ivan Sergei’s archaeologist, a different film again from the ones GREAT! Movies showed on the previous two nights.

GREAT! Movies Schedule: Friday 21 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete GREAT! Movies schedule for Friday 21 August 2026, on Freeview 62.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on GREAT! Movies today

The overnight hours mix a genuine sci-fi curiosity in with the usual action fare. Predestination opens at 1:09am, a 2014 puzzle-box thriller with Ethan Hawke as a time-travelling agent and Sarah Snook in a role built on a twist best left unspoiled, adapted from a Robert Heinlein short story. Blowback follows at 2:50am, a 2022 heist thriller in which a career criminal left for dead by his own crew works his way back through them one by one to reclaim a stolen fortune.

Two vintage westerns take the small hours. Ride in the Whirlwind runs from 4:30am, a 1966 western written by and starring Jack Nicholson alongside Cameron Mitchell and Millie Perkins, following three cowhands mistaken for the outlaws who really committed a stagecoach robbery. The Pledge follows at 5:58am, a 2001 drama directed by Sean Penn with Jack Nicholson as a retired detective who makes a promise to a murdered child’s parents that consumes the rest of his life.

Air Rescue then holds breakfast, five episodes back to back from 7:39am to just before 10am, following the pilots and paramedics of Australia’s Westpac Lifesaver helicopter service as they’re scrambled to a fresh emergency each time. The Quick and the Dead takes over at 9:55am, Sam Raimi’s 1995 gunfighter-tournament western with Sharon Stone facing down Gene Hackman, alongside early roles for Russell Crowe and Leonardo DiCaprio. Second Chances follows at 11:33am, one of the channel’s regular daytime thrillers.

The afternoon runs on the same Lifetime-style crime strand the channel leans on most days. Dispatch opens it at 1:08pm, a 2016 thriller with Fiona Gubelmann as a 911 operator investigating a death after dismissing the original emergency call as a prank. Time Of Death takes the 2:38pm slot, a 2013 thriller with Kathleen Robertson as an FBI agent hunting a killer who strikes at exactly the same minute each time. Living With The Enemy closes out the early evening run at 4:18pm, a 2005 thriller with Sarah Lancaster as a woman whose dream marriage turns out to be built on her tech-billionaire husband’s hidden past.

GREAT! Movies tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the GREAT! Movies primetime line-up for tonight, Friday 21 August 2026.

Staged Killer — GREAT! Movies, 5:52pm

Staged Killer gets the evening going and runs into the primetime hour, a 2019 thriller with Chrishell Stause as morning-show host Naomi Spencer. Her career is on the way back up when former co-host Jake Everett re-enters her professional life, and her personal life starts falling apart at almost the same rate.

Live Once, Die Twice — GREAT! Movies, 7:31pm

Live Once, Die Twice is a 2006 thriller with Kellie Martin as a woman who watches her husband die in a boat explosion, only to discover he faked it and has been living a second life under a different name. Working out what he’s really involved in, with the help of his other wife, takes her somewhere considerably darker than a straightforward affair.

The Double — GREAT! Movies, 9:04pm

At 9:04pm it’s The Double, a 2011 spy thriller with Richard Gere as a retired CIA operative pulled back in to work a case with Topher Grace’s young FBI agent. A US Senator has been assassinated in a style that points to a Soviet-trained killer everyone thought was long dead.

Jack Hunter And The Star Of Heaven — GREAT! Movies, 10:42pm

The night closes with Jack Hunter And The Star Of Heaven, a 2009 adventure with Ivan Sergei as the archaeologist hero. It’s the third and final film in the trilogy, a different case from the Quest for Akhenaten’s Tomb that closed Thursday’s schedule and the Lost Treasure of Ugarit before that — this time the search runs from an empty pharaoh’s tomb through to Constantinople, racing a rival collector and the Russian mob to an artefact nobody wants falling into the wrong hands.

What kind of films are on GREAT! Movies

Classic Hollywood and westerns

The overnight schedule is where the channel’s deepest library lives: 1950s and ’60s Hollywood, John Wayne westerns through to Alan Ladd dramas, accumulated over more than a decade of broadcasting. It’s also the only stretch of the day where the films are genuinely old rather than just cheap, and if you set a recorder for anything here, set it for the small hours.

Lifetime-style crime and thriller movies

Daytime belongs to the made-for-TV thriller that Lifetime and its American equivalents turn out at pace. Missing persons, family secrets, one twist, done inside 90 minutes. Quality swings about a good deal from title to title, and none of it is trying to be more than something to have on.

Contemporary action and thriller premieres

Evenings bring newer titles, generally from the last five to twenty years, mostly domestic-menace thrillers with the occasional proper action picture and a recognisable lead.

How to watch GREAT! Movies

Channel numbers

GREAT! Movies isn’t where it used to be. Here’s where to actually find it now:

Until 4 September 2025 this was an ordinary aerial-only channel on Freeview 50 and Sky 321. GREAT! Mystery has those slots now. Nothing about it costs money, but the broadband requirement is the bit that catches people out, particularly anyone still using an older box.

Streaming online

GREAT! Movies streams free through Great! Player at great-player.com, no account required, with apps for Amazon Fire TV, YouView, and Samsung and LG smart TVs, plus the App Store and Google Play. Alongside the live stream there’s a library of past films, which is how you pick something up after it has aired.

GREAT! sister channels

GREAT! Movies is one of five channels Narrative Entertainment UK Limited runs under the GREAT! banner, all of them part of Sony’s UK line-up before the 2021 sale and rebrand.

All five sit in the same Great! Player app, which is how you reach GREAT! Movies on the platforms that no longer list it.

Frequently asked questions

What channel is GREAT! Movies on Freeview?

Channel 62, a connected Freeview Play slot since 4 September 2025, so it needs broadband as well as an aerial. Older Freeview boxes and standalone recorders without internet access can’t tune in. Freely carries it on 57.

Is GREAT! Movies still on Sky and Virgin Media?

Not under this name. Its old Sky slots (321, HD 318, +1 322) and Virgin Media slot were permanently rebranded to GREAT! Mystery in the same swap. Great! Player is the way to watch it if your TV isn’t set up for Freeview Play or Freely.

What’s on GREAT! Movies tonight?

Staged Killer at 5:52pm, Chrishell Stause as a TV host whose career revival comes at a personal cost. Live Once, Die Twice at 7:31pm, Kellie Martin unravelling her husband’s faked death. The Double at 9:04pm, Richard Gere and Topher Grace chasing a Senator’s killer. Jack Hunter and the Star of Heaven closes the night at 10:42pm, the last of Ivan Sergei’s three archaeologist films. Gere is the most recognisable name on tonight’s schedule.

Is GREAT! Movies free to watch, and does it carry adverts?

Free on all three: Freeview Play, Freely and Great! Player. There are ad breaks during films, as on any commercially funded channel, but no subscription and no sign-in required.

Who owns GREAT! Movies?

Narrative Entertainment UK Limited. It launched on Sky in May 2012 as Sony Movie Channel, reached Freeview in January 2017, became Sony Movies in 2019, and took the GREAT! Movies name in May 2021 after Narrative Capital bought Sony’s UK free-to-air channels.

What are the GREAT! sister channels?

GREAT! Action (Freeview 42), GREAT! TV (Freeview 34), GREAT! Romance (Freeview 52) and GREAT! Mystery (Freeview 50), which took over GREAT! Movies’ old, more prominent Freeview slot. All stream free via Great! Player.

Can I watch GREAT! Movies online for free, and is there catch-up?

Yes. Great! Player at great-player.com, plus apps on Freeview Play, Freely, YouView, Amazon Fire TV, and Samsung and LG smart TVs. No account needed, and the film library works as catch-up.

Verdict

The programming hasn’t got worse. The finding of it has. A channel that used to be a couple of button presses away now wants a broadband connection, a Freeview Play box or the Great! Player app, and some willingness to go looking, which is a genuine cost for something whose whole appeal was being there when you flicked past it.

Whether the effort is worth it depends on the night. Tonight opens with Chrishell Stause in Staged Killer and a Kellie Martin thriller, before Richard Gere and Topher Grace give the evening its biggest name recognition in The Double at 9pm. Ivan Sergei’s Jack Hunter trilogy wraps up just after 10:40pm, closing out three straight nights of the same archaeologist without repeating a single film. A solid rather than essential Friday, but a reasonable one to leave on.

Related: Film4 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week